


Only Stardust

by codefiant



Category: Uchu Senkan Yamato | Space Battleship Yamato (Anime)
Genre: Death Wish, Flashbacks, Gen, Mental Health Issues, Military Families, Parenthood, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, References to Child Death, References to Genocide, War Crimes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-25
Updated: 2018-03-25
Packaged: 2019-04-08 02:41:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,020
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14095320
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/codefiant/pseuds/codefiant
Summary: Ashes to ashes, stardust to stardust.Kodai Susumu struggles to adapt to civilian life after leaving the EDF.





	Only Stardust

**Author's Note:**

> First off, quick trigger warning: there is a single instance of an adult slapping a child after being triggered, and promptly being horrified by it.
> 
> Ignoring chunks of canon because, among other things, give me struggling single parent Mamoru or give me death. _Yamato III_ took place in 2205 as per the original production documents; this comes into play near the end.

No one who knows him well is entirely surprised when Kodai Susumu, captain of the _Yamato_ , retires young.

His brother isn't surprised at all. After Susumu tells him in private, Mamoru pulls him into a long hug and says, “I expected this to happen sooner, honestly.” Susumu knows he's thinking of an earlier time, before their family died, when Mamoru had asked him if he would follow in his footsteps and enlist once he was old enough and Susumu's response had been a firm “Never!”

Maybe he'll try to find that boy again.

* * *

His retirement party is a raucous affair. Even the President makes an appearance, and he gets video well-wishes from every former crew member out on tour.

“What are you going to do now?” Aihara asks, arm around the waist of his wife.

“I don't know,” Susumu answers honestly. “But Miyuki is only three. Maybe I'll try stay-at-home dad for a while.”

“Speaking of...” Shima trails off, giving Aihara and his wife a look. The couple giggles, by this point used to such insinuations.

“No one is more upset about us deciding to wait than my grandfather,” Akiko says. “But we've both agreed to wait until Yoshikazu can get a permanent position on the ground.”

“Entirely understandable,” Susumu agreed. “I regret missing what I have of Miyuki's growth.”

Yuki rested her head on his shoulder. “Well we have you all to ourselves now.”

“Hmm,” Susumu maybe agreed.

The most surprising event of the evening doesn't happen until after the party is over, when Susumu and Yuki make their way home to relieve the babysitter. A video message from Dessler of all people is waiting for him. It's not live like the others, the distance being far too great, but it's still entirely unexpected.

“ _I've heard from the ambassador of your retirement from the EDF. I'm surprised, but I do know that gamilans and earthers come from different stock in such matters. I hope this does not mean that we will never meet again, and I wish you well in finding something as worthy of your time as captaining the_ Yamato.”

The message is short and to the point. “Well, that's Dessler,” Yuki said.

“Yep, that's Dessler,” Susumu agreed, feeling something settle in his stomach that wasn't light intoxication.

He had nightmares that night.

* * *

Parenting Miyuki full time lasted for... a while. But Yuki could see him slowly going downhill. “You miss being a captain,” she told him, late one night, when she found him in the kitchen unable to sleep.

“No I don't.”

“I'm not talking about the military.”

“I know you're not. But there's a reason civilian ships have guns too.”

“Not the ones that stay local, that are firmly in safe territory.”

Susumu snorted. “You can honestly see me captaining a cruise ship?”

Yuki sighed. “Well you need to find something to focus your mind on, or you're eventually going to do something stupid.”

“You're worried about me.”

“Of course I'm worried about you.”

Yuki stared at Susumu; Susumu stared out the window. Neither said anything. Eventually, Yuki went back to bed alone.

* * *

Eventually Susumu tried to follow Yuki's advice, grasping at threads of potential lives. But nothing held his interest for long, and every time he failed it took him longer to try again.

Miyuki, now six years old, came home from school one day. “Today we talked about what we want to be when we grow up!”

“Oh?” Susumu said as he prepared her after-school snack. “And what did you say?”

“That I want to fire cannons in combat just like you!”

Susumu froze.

“Daddy?”

The peanut butter jar slipped from his hand and shattered on the floor as he turned on the spot and slapped his six year old daughter. He looked down at her, tears welling in her eyes, hand on her cheek in shock, and fled.

* * *

He let the call from Yuki go to voicemail. He didn't listen to it until well after the sun had set.

“ _I'm not mad_ ,” she started. “ _Miyuki told me what happened. I explained to her why you didn't like what she said. She understands. She wants you to come home. We both do. Please. At least call me back._ ”

It was another hour until he called her back. “ _Susumu?_ ” she answered hesitantly. “ _When are you coming home?_ ”

“'Didn't like what she said' is an understatement,” he didn't answer.

“ _She doesn't hate you Susumu_.”

“I'm a terrible father.”

“ _No you're not_.”

Susumu was silent for long enough that Yuki was probably starting to wonder if he'd hung up on her. “Domon said the exact same thing to me the first time we met,” he eventually settled on.

“ _...Oh_.”

Susumu huffed bitterly. “Yeah. Oh.”

“ _Susumu-_ ”

“I don't know when I'm coming home,” he cut her off. “But I will. I promise.”

* * *

Susumu was home before Yuki woke Miyuki up for school the next morning. Upon seeing him, Miyuki gave him a brief hug before sitting before the breakfast that Yuki had prepared for her.

“Daddy?” she asked after a while, and Susumu turned to see that she had finished. “Why aren't you making my lunch?”

Susumu shook his head. “You're not going to school today. I'm going to take you somewhere instead.”

Miyuki was silent during the drive, and the walk across the grass afterwards. “Do you know where we are?” Susumu asked after they arrived at their destination.

“A graveyard.”

“And do you know who this is?” Miyuki shook her head. “His name was Domon Ryusuke. He served under me during the conflict between Galman-Gamilas and the Bolar Federation. When I asked him which division he wanted to be assigned to, he told me that he wanted to be in the combat division like me, much like you did. He died less than a year later.”

“Oh.”

Susumu crouched down beside her and put his hands on her shoulders. “Do you understand why I'm showing you this? I never, ever want this to happen to you.”

“But what if the aliens come back?” she asked. “What if people need to fight?”

“If that day will come, that day will come. And I will fight again, and your mother will fight. And maybe there will be a point where you have no choice but to fight. But that is not something you decide. It is a moment in time in which everything changes. You will know it if it happens. If you are unsure, then it hasn't happened yet. You must not fight before that moment.”

Miyuki frowned, thinking hard. “I _think_ I understand.”

Susumu smiled supportively. “It's okay, I don't expect you to. You will understand more when you're older, but you probably won't really understand unless it happens to you.”

He spent the rest of the morning introducing her to more old friends. Then he took her home and made them lunch. Afterwards he left her to her own devices while he went to lie down. He wasn't sure if he really slept – what he saw seemed too real.

* * *

It was after a family dinner, when the hour was starting to catch up with the girls but they weren't quite ready to go to bed yet, and would protest vociferously if coaxed, that Mamoru found Susumu in the study, surrounded by the remains of abandoned hobbies. “So I was the beneficiary of a grapevine earlier this week,” Mamoru started.

Susumu spun in the desk chair to face him. “Oh?”

Mamoru set his wine glass down and leaned against the desk. “Miyuki wanted to know where the scar on your leg came from, but didn't want to ask you. So she asked Sasha, older and wiser and knower of all things. Sasha of course didn't know, so she asked me.” Mamoru frowned. “Show me.”

Susumu bent down and rolled up his right pant leg, revealing the jagged scar that ran all the way up his calf. Mamoru whistled lowly. “Wow. You're probably lucky that didn't sever anything vital.”

Susumu pushed the fabric back down, hiding the scar once again. “It did take out a sensory nerve or two. But that just meant that between that and the adrenaline I could still walk on it afterwards. Any lingering effects are what physical therapy is for.”

“You're joking. Or crazy. Or both.”

“It was during the Comet Empire's invasion of Sol,” Susumu said lowly, bringing silence. “I got off easy.”

Mamoru huffed, turning his head to look out the window. Eventually he said, “I keep waiting for the other shoe to drop, you know?”

Susumu's laugh was just as bitter. “Yeah.” He picked up his own wine glass and drank.

“Yuki's worried about you,” Mamoru said.

“She's always worried about me.”

“I'm worried about you too.”

“Are you two going to gang up on me now?” Susumu shook his head. “You've got better things to do than bully this old soldier.”

“Susumu you're thirty-one.”

“Really?” He took another gulp. “Seems like a lot longer.”

* * *

As a myth, as a story, the _Yamato_ would live forever.

But the _Yamato_ itself was only flesh and bone, metaphorically speaking, and the oldest ship in the fleet by over 200 years depending on how you counted. Her fall was inevitable because, like any good soldier, no one had the heart to tell her that she had gotten too old and that it was time to retire. She had a good captain though, one who knew how to keep his head on his shoulders, and only twelve crew members died when an unexpected gravity well at the warp-out point caused a serious hull breach in a critical area near the engine room.

That captain, Shima Daisuke, was lauded as a hero. Susumu saw his smiling face on the news feed. “I hear you're a hero now,” Susumu said the next time he saw him. “Congratulations.”

Shima scratched the back of his neck bashfully. “The captain gets all the glory, huh?”

“Or lack of.”

Shima frowned. “Kodai...”

Susumu nearly whispered, “I didn't deserve it.”

“Kodai-”

“Miyuki's learning about me in school,” he said. “She says that all her classmates think I'm awesome and are jealous of her because her dad's a hero.”

“You know, they rescued the wreck,” Shima informed him. “They're going to patch her back up, beach her, and turn her into a museum.”

“They should have left her there,” Susumu said. “Let her rest again.”

* * *

“...Kodai-san. Kodai-san.”

Susumu blinked. The body in front of him slowly turned into a paramedic, and the cosmogun in his hand disappeared entirely. “...Wha...” he slurred.

“Kodai-san,” the paramedic said slowly. “Do you know where you are?”

Home. He was home. Not... where had it been? The _Yamato_. “Home,” he said roughly. He frowned. “Why are you here?”

“Your daughter called 911. She was worried about you.”

“Well I'm fine. Go help someone who needs it.”

“It's okay,” the paramedic said softly. “You're not the first vet I've seen to.”

“I'm _fine_ ,” Susumu insisted, and to prove his point he pushed himself up off the floor. His hands only shook a little.

* * *

One day, when Miyuki was nine, Susumu packed a bag and left. He didn't say goodbye. He did leave a note though – he didn't want to worry Yuki unduly, and he definitely didn't want her to start a manhunt for her wayward husband.

When he arrived at the airport, the ship whose captain had agreed to take him as a passenger was just starting to load up her cargo. “Thank you for doing this for me,” Susumu told him after greeting him. “Not many ships head to Galman-Gamilas.”

“Anything for you sir,” the captain said, grinning. “I guess we're both lucky that the ambassador suddenly got homesick and decided to have some things rush-shipped to him.”

From the porthole, Susumu watched Earth run away from him, into the darkness of space.

It was a twelve day trip to Galman-Gamilas. Dessler came to greet him as soon as he heard that he'd arrived. “If I'd known you were coming...”

“It was spur of the moment,” Susumu greeted him. “I'd heard that the ambassador was having some things imported and hitched a ride.”

Dessler's mouth twitched downward. “Ah yes... the ambassador.”

Susumu swallowed. “Dessler. This isn't a social visit.”

Dessler frowned. “I suspected as much. Shall we talk in private in my office?”

Susumu nodded in agreement. “I would appreciate it.”

Dessler's office was just as lavish as it had been the last time Susumu had stepped into it, ten years ago. The décor had changed, probably in keeping with the local fashions, but Susumu didn't doubt that it was just as expensive. “So,” Dessler said as he sat down behind his desk. “What can I do for you?”

Susumu found himself snapping to attention. “I would like.” He swallowed. “I would like you to try me for war crimes.”

Dessler froze. “What?”

“Under my command, the _Yamato_ committed genocide against the people of Gamilas. I would like to be held accountable.”

“No,” Dessler answered immediately.

“No? Why not? I-”

Dessler cut him off. “Galman-Gamilas does not have laws governing such things that you could be tried under. Even if we did, you are considered a hero on Earth and it would be a disaster for relations. And even if both these things were not true, I simply do not want to. I respect you, and the drive that led you to those actions, far too much to punish you for them.”

“Dessler-”

“My answer is no,” Dessler cut him off. “And it will remain no, no matter your arguments.”

Susumu breathed. “How many noncombatants were on Gamilas?”

“Kodai-”

“ _How many?_ ”

Dessler sighed. “Would it change how you felt if I told you?”

“...No.”

“Then I will not.”

* * *

Yuki was furious when he returned home. “Dessler sent me a message. Told me what you did. What you tried to do.” She got up in his face. “How _dare_ you,” she hissed.

“Gamilas was the only one where there were survivors,” Susumu said as he set his bag down.

“I was there too you know!”

“And I was the commanding officer!” Susumu bellowed back.

“Maybe you haven't thought through the ramifications, but what you just did was an elaborate suicide attempt!”

“I was trying to obtain justice for the people I murdered!”

Yuki suddenly hugged him tightly. The tears in her eyes took the fight out of him. “You're not a murderer,” she said, “You're a soldier.”

“Is there a difference?”

Yuki bit her lip. “Not as much as people think, I think,” she finally admitted. “But there is one. Especially when you save the entire planet.”

“I killed children Miyuki's age. If not on Gamilas, then Gatlantis. If not Gatlantis-”

“I know,” Yuki said. “I was there. And so was everyone else. A ship is not run by a single person. Shima-san did not decide to turn the ship around. The Black Tiger squadron did not decide to stay in their hangar. The cannon crews did not decide to hold their fire. We are all responsible. Stop blaming it all on yourself.” She took a deep, shuddering breath. “And if it had worked? What was I supposed to tell Miyuki?”

Susumu finally returned the hug. “I'm sorry,” he apologized softly. “I'll... I'll try.” Try what, he didn't know.

* * *

A couple days later, Susumu went to the EDF headquarters to track down Sanada. There was at least one thing he could salvage from his trip to Galman-Gamilas. “I went to Galman-Gamilas,” he told him when he found him.

Sanada gave him a look. “I know.”

“The ambassador should be replaced. I got the feeling that he's been making trouble.”

“I'll pass that on. Kodai.” Sanada frowned slightly. He stared at Susumu for several moments. “Yuki told me what you did.”

“I suppose you're going to make your opinion known too.”

Sanada shook his head. “I'm going to do you one better.” He wrote something down on the memo pad in front of him, then ripped the page out and handed it to Susumu. It was a telephone number. “This is the number of a psychologist who specializes in combat-related mental illness,” he explained. “She comes highly recommended.”

Susumu looked back up at him. “And you just had this number handy?”

Sanada shook his head with a sad smile. “Yuki told me what you did because she wanted to know if I had any suggestions. I was actually going to send her this information this evening.”

Susumu folded the paper and pocketed it. “Thank you, then.” He turned to go.

“Also, Kodai.” Susumu turned back. Sanada paused. “Come by our apartment sometime this weekend,” he said. “I have something I want to show you.”

“I'll try,” Susumu promised.

* * *

Saturday brought with it foul weather, which meant that the planned beach trip was canceled. Lacking anything better to do, Susumu left a deeply disappointed Miyuki with Yuki and drove to meet with Sanada.

Sanada greeted him at the door. “I'm glad you could make it. Come in.”

“We were planning on going to the beach,” Susumu explained as he shucked off his drenched raincoat. “Miyuki tried to convince us that a little bit of rain was no reason to cancel.”

Sanada chuckled. “'A little bit of rain' indeed.”

“We won when we pointed out that there was a flood warning.”

“You're lucky. That probably wouldn't have worked on Sasha, and definitely not on Mio. Sasha is at the age where she thinks she's invincible, and Mio is at the age where she screams if she doesn't get her way.”

“Did you and Mamoru do the math when you adopted her and realize that you would be raising a teenager and a toddler at the same time?” Susumu looked around. “Where are they today anyway?”

“Mamoru took them to the indoor amusement park to burn off some energy. I stayed behind, because I didn't know when you were coming. And,” he shrugged, “I don't go to those sorts of places anyway. I'm actually kind of glad that you came while they were gone.”

“Oh?”

Sanada beckoned. “Come with me.”

Sanada led him into what Susumu knew to be his workroom, but had never been in before. He was surprised at what he saw. “You paint?”

Sanada nodded. “I did want to be an artist before I turned to science. I took it back up a while ago.”

Susumu looked over some of the finished artwork. “I'd always assumed that this room was full of mechanical things and blueprints.”

“The only reason Mamoru and the girls know better is that they see the art supplies go in.”

Susumu looked up at him in shock. “You mean Mamoru's never even been in here?”

Sanada shook his head. “He knows better than to disturb me while I'm working. After all, I started painting again for a reason.” His visage turned serious. “Have you ever tried art, Kodai?”

“No. I'm not an artist type,” Susumu denied.

“You should try it,” Sanada suggested. “I know you've been at loose ends for years now. It might help with your problems. It's certainly helped with mine.”

“Your problems?”

Sanada reached out and put a hand on his shoulder. “There were eighteen survivors,” he reminded him. “Not one.”

The corner of Susumu's mouth turned up humorlessly. “I suppose you're right, huh?”

* * *

Susumu called the number and made an appointment. It felt like a waste of time, so he didn't go again. A box arrived, from Sanada. It was full of art supplies. Susumu taped it back up and shoved it in the closet in the study. Yuki started keeping a closer eye on him. He probably deserved it.

Life goes on.

Fifteen year old Sasha shows up at his house while he's home alone, a bus ticket sticking out of her pocket, her already impressive eyelashes practically dripping with mascara, and a pink streak in her hair. “Shouldn't you be in school?” he asked.

“Who wants to know?” she shot back, picking at the deliberately frayed threads on her jeans, wrists clattering with more bangles than strictly necessary.

“I will not enable your teenage rebellion.”

Sasha shook her head. “That's not why I'm here.” She collapsed onto the couch in the way only a teenager can. “I...” She worried at her lip. “I wanted to talk about something.”

Susumu sighed and sat down on the other couch, rubbing at his forehead. “And you couldn't do this some other time?”

“There's always someone else around, you know? This is the only time I could think of where I'd catch you alone.”

“Okay then. I'll try to help. But after that I'm driving you back to school.”

Sasha nodded. “Okay. Umm. It's just. You never talk about the _Yamato_.”

Susumu froze. “You want to ask me about the _Yamato_?”

Sasha shook her head almost violently. “Yes! I mean no! I mean!” She cut herself off. “It's just, people don't talk about these things, you know? We learn about them in history, but it's so bare bones, it's so... not like how it was at all. And growing up with Dad and Shiro and you and Aunt Yuki, I know there's so much more, but people don't talk about it.” She looked over at him. “Why don't people talk about it?”

Susumu leaned back against the couch. “Because it's. Because it's not a good story.”

“But you saved the Earth. You saved all of humanity.”

“That doesn't make it a good story.”

Sasha pulled her knees up against her chest and stared at them. “I know that... I remember,” she said after her first false start.

“Remember what?”

“Only a little bit, but. When the sun was exploding. I remember a little bit of that. How it was really hot and Dad was really scared and he said that he loved me every day. And being underground and never knowing if it was night or day and Dad taking me to work with him and hiding under his desk whenever people started shouting at each other.” She looked up from her knees. “And you guys did that for _eight years_ and my history textbook has _two paragraphs_ about how humanity persevered.” She took a deep breath. “And I know that last year you did _something_ , and everyone was really mad at you, but no one will talk about it. Why don't people talk about these things?”

Susumu sighed and leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees. “Because life is ugly, and people don't like to remember that. So we whitewash it, or we pretend that it didn't happen at all. And by the time the hurt feelings are gone, that's the only version that's left.”

“Like how Earth used to be?”

“What do you mean?”

“When I was a kid, Dad told me stories about what the Earth used to be like before Gamilas bombed us,” Sasha explained. “Old growth forests and how the coastlines and mountains were different, and all the different plants and animals that went extinct. And what it was like to walk through a city when the architecture wasn't all the same, when they'd come into existence acre by acre instead of all at once.” She tilted her head. “He made it sound perfect. But nothing's perfect, right?”

Susumu shook his head. “No. But if you want the details you'll have to ask someone older than me. I was ten when we went underground.”

“But aren't you curious though?”

“I know that nothing's perfect, and that some things aren't worth the cost of knowing them. Like you said, the _Yamato_ saved the Earth. That's a good story. It's a story that makes people happy.” He swallowed. “I will tell you something, if you want to hear it. Something that people don't talk about. But it's not something you can unhear. It's something you'll remember for the rest of your life.”

He let Sasha think about it. Then she said, “I want to hear it.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes.”

Susumu sighed, wishing she'd said no but knowing that offering her the option of knowledge was the right thing to do. “There were fifteen-year-old nieces on Gatlantis too.”

Sasha was stunned into silence, eyes wide.

Susumu nodded. “This is why we don't talk about these things. Because sometimes the truth isn't just something that hurts – it's a confrontation. It's about what we did to survive looking us in the eye and asking us if it was worth it. We do these things, and then we tell each other good stories so we never have to question if we really did do the right thing. And then the next generation comes along, innocent, and more than ever we have to only tell good stories, because there's nothing we want more than to protect that.” He looked out the window. “Every day I hope that Miyuki and you and Mio never go through that.” He looked back at her. “Behind every thing that people don't talk about is knowledge like that. That's why we don't talk about it.” He stood. “Would you like me to make you something to drink before I take you back to school?”

And then he collapsed.

* * *

Cancer isn't uncommon, these days. Because that's the diagnosis he eventually gets, after his seizure led to a battery of tests led to finding a mass in his brain that wasn't supposed to be there.

It doesn't look good.

The day after the doctor told him, he sat down on the edge of Miyuki's bed after tucking her in. “Miyuki,” he started, “There's something we need to talk about.”

“Mm-hmm?”

“I'm...” He swallowed. “I'm really sick. And I might die soon.”

“I'm not stupid Dad,” Miyuki said, matter of fact. “You've been sick for years.”

Susumu blinked, briefly at a loss for words. “I suppose you're right,” he responded.

* * *

By the time Shima is back on leave again, the chemo has started to take its toll. “You look like shit Kodai,” he said once the front door closed behind him.

“Yeah, well, I feel like shit.”

Shima grabbed his arm. “How bad is it?” he asked lowly.

Susumu looked away. “If I'm lucky, I'll see grandchildren.” He paused. “We had Miyuki's genes sequenced. I didn't pass it on, thank god.”

Shima smiled. “Not so small mercies.”

The months pass. He goes off chemo and onto medications to manage the symptoms. He's paying closer attention now, and can finally admit what everyone has been telling him between the lines for years. Internally he tries to blame it on the tumor, but he knows better – ignoring his PTSD, survivor's guilt, whatever it was, has been making it worse for a lot longer than he's had cancer. But that doesn't magically make him know how to deal with it, which is why he'd been ignoring it in the first place.

One day Miyuki, all of eleven years old, so mature, so much more mature than she should have to be, talked him out of a flashback. And he looked at her, crouched on the floor in front of him, and saw Yuki. And he realized that he never asked her, after all these years, what had driven her to study nursing. It hadn't been her profession in over a decade, not since her combat experience had led her to becoming General Todo's aide, but her instincts as a caregiver had never left.

He wondered if he was now doing to their daughter something that had happened to her. They thought of their children as innocent, but every time they brought Miyuki, and Sasha and Mio, to the Hill of Heroes they were stripping it away. Sasha already, instead of continuing on at a normal high school, had transferred to an EDF military academy, even after what he'd told her. He'd asked her why, too tired to be angry, and she'd said, “To protect people who ignore the truth.”

* * *

For lack of anything better to do, he eventually pulled the box from Sanada out of the closet and took a closer look at what was inside it. Paper of varying thicknesses, pencils, brushes, small bottles of paint, a tray of watercolors. He opened up one of sketchbooks of regular paper and started drawing.

The result, predictably, looked much like the last thing he had drawn, way back when he was in the single digits. The person was slightly more advanced than a stick figure, but not by much. He was tempted to toss it all back in the closet, but Miyuki was at school and all he had for company was his own head. So he turned the page and tried again.

After a couple more pages he moved out of his own mind. He drew one of the bookshelves. He drew the desk. He drew the view out the window. None of them were remotely what he'd call good, but he supposed it was a start.

Then he drew himself.

He didn't look in a mirror, or at a photograph. He just drew. Features that vaguely resembled his, from the hand of a complete beginner, slowly took their places on the page. He moved slowly, putting more time into getting it closer to right than the previous drawings.

Finally, after what felt like hours but he knew couldn't have been that long, he picked up the sketchbook and held it out in front of himself. Despite the extra effort, it still looked like something a kid had drawn. In fact...

He'd seen something very similar at Miyuki's school once. A hallway display labeled 'Our Heroes', below which was a classroom's worth of drawings of people. In a rush of negative emotions he slammed the sketchbook back down on the desk and scribbled the pencil back and forth across across the page, hard enough to nearly rip the paper. Then, before he could really think about why, he snapped a picture of it and sent it to Sanada.

_There's an impressive amount of self-loathing in this piece_ , Sanada's response came quickly. _Do you feel better?_

Susumu thought about it. _Yeah actually, I do._

 

**Author's Note:**

> \- Sanada opened his mouth in his character development episode and I immediately knew that he and Mamoru were absolutely banging. At the bare minimum Sanada had wanted to tap that.
> 
> \- I could write small essays on the issues I have with _Be Forever_ and _Final Yamato_.
> 
> \- I'm on Tumblr: codefiant.tumblr.com


End file.
